Other related coverage

AS THE cricket world stepped up security yesterday, Pakistan
came under fire for providing "shameful" protection to players and
officials during Tuesday's terror attack in Lahore.

Sri Lankan spinner Muthiah Muralidaran, the greatest
wicket-taker in the game's history, launched a stinging attack on
Pakistan's security forces, adding weight to the testimony of
Australian umpires Steve Davis and Simon Taufel, who described how
they were abandoned during the gun battle.

Eight people, including six security forces, were killed in the
ambush by 12 masked gunmen armed with Kalashnikovs, grenades and a
rocket launcher.

In Durban, South African authorities responded by increasing the
previously low-key security for the Australian team on the eve of
tonight's second Test. Ricky Ponting and his team were accompanied
at training by security personnel wearing bullet-proof vests and
carrying massive machine guns.

This came as questions were asked about why the Pakistan team,
which would normally have been part of the convoy travelling to the
ground, left five minutes after the Sri Lankans and officials, and
Lahore police conceded they had been warned of a possible
attack.

Muralidaran, in an interview with The Age, said the
security arrangement was the worst he had seen, and vastly inferior
to that provided in Sri Lanka, where specially trained armed guards
travel with the team.

"The security was not good enough and we were sitting ducks
because of that," he said.

"The security people we had didn't even seem to fight back. Were
they professionals with enough training? They didn't seem to know
what to do. I was surprised the terrorists were able to just reload
the magazines and keep firing, and they never got caught. It was
shameful. If this had happened in Colombo they would never have got
away."

While the bus made a successful dash to Gaddafi Stadium, the
officials in the van behind were left stranded after their driver
was killed. "You tell me why supposedly 25 armed commandos were in
our convoy and when the team bus got going again we were left on
our own," Taufel said at Sydney airport on his return
yesterday.

Davis said he thought the passengers of the van were "goners".
"All the windows were being shot in and the glass was going all
over us, the side door opened and I looked from where I was laying
and I saw a (man in) uniform with a pistol and I thought this is an
insider come to do us away," Davis said. "I thought I was gone
then, I thought we were all gone."

He said when a police officer was later asked to drive the van
away by English match referee Chris Broad he refused, saying "I
can't drive", and ducked for cover.

"Eventually another police officer came from somewhere, opened
the front door, got rid of the (dead) driver  it sounds
terrible  but he took his body out of the car and hopped in,
and away we went at a million miles an hour with the door flying
open."

Broad expressed similar sentiments, saying that instead of the
"presidential-style" security they were promised, forces fled and
"left us to be sitting ducks". He also questioned the late
departure of the Pakistan team: "Did someone know something and
they held the Pakistan bus back?"

Taufel echoed that sentiment. "There are a lot of questions. I
mean the first two days both team buses left at the same time. The
third day the Pakistan team bus leaves five minutes after the Sri
Lankan one. Why did that happen?" Taufel said.

Pakistan Cricket Board chief Ijaz Butt hit back at the
criticism, rejecting any notion of a conspiracy and calling Broad's
comments about fleeing security forces a "lie". "How can Chris
Broad say this when six policemen were killed?" Mr Butt asked. He
said Pakistan would lodge a protest with the ICC about the
comments.

But Lahore police commissioner Khusro Pervez conceded security
was inadequate. "All convoys are provided outer cordons, but in
this case the outer cordon did not respond or it was not enough,"
he told Dawn newspaper.

He also confirmed police were warned of a possible attack: "It's
correct that we were forewarned there were many pieces of
information."

According to police, one of the gunmen was in the
Pearl-Continental Hotel, where the players were staying, and
followed the convoy, telling the other attackers waiting in ambush
of the cricketers' precise route.

Closed-circuit television footage shows how easily the gunmen
escaped from the scene at Liberty traffic circle, with two of them
calmly walking away down an alley.

In the alley, they met another man on a motorcycle. The gunmen
jumped on and the three drove off. There was no sign of any police
officers in pursuit or of any security presence in the alley.

Mushtaq Sukhera, head of the investigations department of the
Lahore police force, told the Guardian a dumped rucksack
believed to belong to one of the assailants contained large
quantities of food and water, plus a number of guns and grenades,
which has led officials to believe the attackers planned to board
the bus and take the Sri Lankan players hostage.

Each gunman was wearing a backpack containing supplies, much
like those who attacked the Indian city of Mumbai last November.
CCTV footage also shows some of the assailants were wearing suicide
vests.

Pakistani police have arrested 50 suspects, but admit none were
gunmen involved in the attack. They released photofits of four
suspects.

The Tamil Tigers, the rebel group that has waged a 25-year armed
struggle against the Sri Lankan Government, last night denied
involvement.

Meanwhile, the fate of the 2009 Indian Premier League is in
doubt because it clashes with the Indian election next month. There
are concerns that Indian security forces will not be able to cope
with two such large events at the same time.

Muralidaran, who turns 37 next month, said the attack would not
push him into retirement. But he said: "Every cricket-playing
nation will have to take security much more seriously now, not just
in the subcontinent, but also in places like Australia."